The War Court and Lap Pillow, Austria's Mandate of Heaven

Chapter 1181 Find a new way
There are many reasons for the failure of the Austrian Empire in history, including domestic political instability, suppression by foreign hostile forces, destruction caused by war, economic decline, weakness of senior officials, and incompetence of executors.

All these factors combined to lead to the Austro-Hungarian compromise, which allowed the Austrian Empire to survive for several decades, but it could only survive for a short time.

If Prince Schwarzenberg's policies could be continued, if Alexander Bach could get the support of the imperial high-level officials, if Franz in history could have been determined enough, and if the executors were not bad and stupid enough to implement the imperial policies reasonably.

If the Austrian Empire had not been defeated in the Battle of Magenta and the Battle of Solferino in succession, if it had not been tricked by Prussia in the Prussian-Danish War, if it had not suffered a disastrous defeat in the Battle of Königgrätz.

But there are not so many ifs, and there is no need for so many ifs.

Franz doesn't like gambling, whether he has an advantage or his life is on the line.

Due to some traditions and culture, Austrians, and even Europeans, are superstitious about decentralization and economic sanctions.

Franz did not intend to split the Crown of St. Stephen into four parts: Hungary, Slovakia, Croatia, and Transylvania.

In other words, Franz did not intend to split Hungary into only four parts. He would split Hungary (today's land) into three parts, namely Western Hungary, Central Hungary, and Eastern Hungary.

Franz was not prepared to appoint countless governors to check and balance each other. He planned to merge Western Hungary, Central Hungary, the southwestern plains of Slovakia, and the countless royal estates scattered therein into a new royal territory.

That's right, instead of letting the Hungarians split up and reunite like weeds that can't be burned out by wildfires and will grow again in the spring breeze, it is better to directly reduce their size.

According to Franz's plan, Hungary would lose 91% of the territory of the Crown of St. Stephen. At the same time, the area of ​​the royal territory would increase exponentially, which would effectively prevent the Hungarians from rising again.

As for the Hungarian Parliament, it is not important whether it exists or not. What is important is whether the Parliament obeys Franz's orders and whether it has the ability to go its own way.

First of all, the power of the Hungarian Parliament must be restricted, and all political, economic, military, cultural, and judicial powers must be returned to the government.

But parliament is not a place to keep idle people. The power of supervision and reporting must be there, and the remaining power is the power of approval.

For example, if Franz wanted to turn Western Hungary and Central Hungary into royal territories, it must have been approved by the Hungarian Parliament, and it was definitely not forced by Franz.

Members of the Hungarian Parliament must be strictly screened to ensure that no illegal elements are allowed to infiltrate.

After this transformation, the Austrian imperial government and royal family no longer had to fear parliament.

As for comprehensive economic sanctions, they are unnecessary. First, they are unnecessary. Second, given the style and efficiency of the Austrian imperial bureaucracy at that time, it would probably be impossible to implement them. Instead, it would cause complaints and cultivate a new generation of privileged class.

Restricting imports and exports is not suitable for a place like Hungary. The Great Hungarian Plain is the granary of the Austrian Empire. How can they starve themselves?
Not only will Franz not restrict imports and exports, he will also develop large mechanized farms like the royal territories.

As for restricting industrial development, there is no need for that either. As long as the Austrian Empire's cheap industrial products can enter the Hungarian market unimpeded, it will be impossible for Hungary to develop industry.

Instead of restricting industry and causing complaints, it would be better to build roads and allow shipping to pass. This would not only make Hungary's industry disappear, but also win the hearts of the people and control the superstructure.

There was no need to prohibit investment, after all, no one would do a business that would lose money, and businessmen were not saints, so they would naturally invest and develop according to Franz's ideas. The bad habit of privately minting coins should be banned, but Franz didn't mind the Magyars contributing their silver and gold.

The top priority of all economic measures is land policy. More than 90% of the people in post-war Hungary will be serfs. If the land problem is not properly resolved, it will definitely leave hidden dangers.

Historically, the Austrian Empire's land redemption policy was shared by the government and the liberated serfs, and the land redemption price was set at twenty times the annual output.

The peasants and the government would each pay one-third of the price for the land, the landlord would have to accept a one-third loss, and the serfs would be freed from all feudal obligations.

This seems to be very beautiful and reasonable. With the help of the state, serfs only have to bear one-third of the original cost of the land, and it is a gratifying thing for the landlord to accept one-third of the loss.

However, the reality was that the heavy economic burden not only made the serfs impoverished and constantly under tremendous mental pressure, but in the end most of them also lost their ability to keep their land.

The lives of the farmers did not improve, and some even began to miss the days when they were serfs.

The already depressed economy of the Austrian Empire was directly crushed by the debt problem caused by land reform, and the landlords and nobles also complained.

Why did the imagined win-win situation for all three parties end up turning into a lose-lose situation for all three parties?

Because the so-called annual output is too variable, and the workload of verifying it one by one is extremely exaggerated, the so-called investigation ultimately became a mere formality.

The amount of annual output depends entirely on the mood of local officials and their relationship with local gentry, which leaves room for maneuver.

In the end, the landlords who filled in their output truthfully suffered losses to varying degrees, while those who increased their annual output through bribery and falsification not only reaped rich rewards, but even got their land back.

It is so simple that bad money drives out good money. It would be strange if people didn't do something tricky under such a trend.

Similarly, some farmers with quick minds and good connections also copied it, and in the end, the only ones who suffered losses were the country and the "honest people".

In addition, the Austrian imperial government also underestimated compound interest. When farmers and the government could not repay their debts, interest would be generated. As the principal and interest continued to increase, in the end, the income of most farmers could not even repay the interest. Not only did they lose their land, but they also became another form of slavery.

Hungarian nationalism also suffered a great loss as a result, and as the situation grew stronger, the Austrian Empire had to start considering showing goodwill to Hungary.

So Franz's approach was to nationalize the land, allowing the nobles and landlords to directly bear the cost of liberating the serfs, with the state acting as the middleman and referee.

(As mentioned earlier, nobles used land to buy shares in royal estates. Some nobles had already done so before the war, and this was the last window of opportunity.)
Landlords can obtain sustainable profits, and serfs can also benefit from being liberated as soon as possible.

Responsibilities and obligations should never be one-sided. Since serfs have fulfilled their feudal obligations to landlords and nobles for thousands of years, the landlords and nobles should also assume corresponding responsibilities.

In this way, Franz could use the price paid by others to exchange for his own greatest benefit. At the same time, he could not only tie the nobles and landowners to his chariot, but also win the hearts of the people.